Disable Auto Start/Stop on new Passat

[Buzy_Robot]

Wai, the air conditioning seems to keep working when the engine has stopped - or at least the fan keeps blowing until the air con can kick in again once the engine has restarted. If you choose a really cold or hot setting, the start/stop system is disabled and the engine keeps running until the air con reaches the desired temperature.

[wai]

Fair enough.

Many if these systems are really designed to allow manufacturers to achieve their fleet average consumption targets. Whether they are practical is not necessarily relevant.

[jetfuel]

I live In Cairns and if the air conditioning isn't cold enough the engine wont stop. If the inside tempereature rises the engine will start to cool the car down. If you live in a big city in peak traffic it would be a real benefit. I often turn it off as I drive out my street. You have the option not to use it

[astroboy38]

I've had my 2011 Passat 125TDI for about 2 weeks and i'm not a big fan of the auto start/stop feature either. At long traffic lights, its great, but generally speaking, i think its pretty useless. There are lots of occasions where by this feature is more annoying than anything else. When you need to get off the line quickly (e.g. turning into a busy intersection from a side street, peak hours traffic), it takes an extra 0.5 sec to start the engine, and the constant start/stop in peak hour is very annoying and i'm not sure if its good for the engine to start/stop so many times. Plus, there has been one occasion whereby the engine has failed to start. Hopefully this isn't a sign of things to come...

I will also speak to my dealer to see if there is a way to turn it off by default - but given OP's feedback, it seems unlikely. I guess we just need to get in to the habit of turning it off as soon as we start the car - very annoying!

[jetfuel]

If you take your foot almost off the brake, but not releasing it, the engine will restart. Takes a while to master it but there are 2 switches in the brake pedal

[Buzy_Robot]

I had an unnerving incident with the start/stop system at an inner city intersection and oncoming traffic earlier this week. Fortunately, no speeding was involved and there was no accident. You see, I was waiting to turn right and deliberately did not press the brake pedal firmly because I didn't want the start/stop sytem to turn the engine off. I was pressing the brake pedal lightly with my foot and fully expected the engine to keep running - not so! My Passat was fully stopped and the engine kept running .... until it turned itself off just as I needed to accelerate. It seemed totally illogical for it to have done this. The manual makes no mention of this whatsoever, but I think Jetfuel is right - this is a dual switch or two-stage system.

Press the brake pedal firmly and the start/stop system turns the engine off immediately. Press the brake pedal lightly and the start/stop system seems to go into a timer mode and eventually turns the engine off. In both situations the car is completely stationary. I tried both methods today, proving my hypothesis. So, I think my reasoning makes sense and I'm wondering if other B7 TDI owners would agree with my findings?

Moral of the story? Use the button to turn off the feature at the start of every journey!

[jetfuel]

I pretty much turn mine off. I had one situation where the car didn't start and I got a message "start car manually", which meant putting it into to neutral and pressing the key again. The only time I am going to use mine is in thick stop/start traffic

[maxim]

It's another stupid, nonsensical system that lulls us into thinking it's a smart and clever system that's saving the environment.

However, I'm in the habit of always slotting autos into neutral whenever I pull up at lights and this cancels the auto stop function. Although I have got caught once where I pulled up at an intersection and went to take off just as the sytem switched off the engine. The car gave a good cough as it started almost before it had completey stopped. So now I turn it off as soon as I start the engine. We should be able to change this default setting to off. I'll be talking to the dealer next week about it.

[rotelman]

This really sounds like a pain in the Butt,

I am not far of ordering a new B7 bassat TDi after driving my current MY09 for 2 1/2 years. In know the pain the guys with stop start are feeling. I have the same problem with the AUTO Hold function. I have to press the button every time I get in the car! ( it's not selectable in Menu in MY09 to default on). I find this a real pain in the butt. Now the new B7 has this selectable Auto hold feature but now have introduced something else to have to activate each time you get in the car,

Think I will hold off until this is made selectable... Surely a VACOM solution is possible??

Rotelman

[maxim]

My appologies, slotting it into neutral does not cancel the auto stop feature. Must have been because the air con was running high or some other reason the times I noticed it.

I'm sure there must be a vacom fix for this though.

[Buzy_Robot]

Just got back from Essendon VW and they were terrific explaining the ins and outs of the start/stop system. It's not a two-step system as I initially thought, rather all dependent on the build up of brake pressure; however, there are something like 20 different conditions that affect its functionality. For example, when I was driving home last Friday afternoon, I couldn't figure out why it wouldn't disable the engine. Turns out the slight increase in engine revs I heard was the diesel particulate filter regenerating, hence for 2-3 kms the start/stop system was disabled. Will take a while to get used to all this technical wizardry and learn to trust it!

[maxim]

... and learn to trust it!

that's what I'm struggling with too. I've only done 1100 k's and have noticed a number of times my engine revs changing when stopped at lights for no apparent reason (actually notice more vibration like the air con coming on, eventhough it's switched off). Don't know what it is, why would the DPF need regenerating numerous times when it's only done that low k's?